14 DAY TRIAL // Wikileaks has been the center of more than enough controversy, understandable given the nature of the site. Still, despite numerous attempts from those less than happy with the service, it is as popular as ever and is now hatching up a new plan to ensure that the documents and sensitive data that do make their way onto the site get the coverage they deserve by partnering with newspapers and other organizations.
A new feature will allow would-be leakers to make their material available to journalists, human rights groups or even law officials via Wikileaks in a safe and easy way with an "upload a disclosure to me via Wikileaks" form, which these groups would have on their sites, as IDG News Service reports. The system would benefit the leaker and the receiver alike. For the one releasing the “sensitive” information there would be the benefit of making it available in a secure and anonymous way while the receiver is relieved of the burden of the legal responsibilities that come with publishing the documents.
"We will take the burden of protecting the source and the legal risks associated with publishing the document," Julien Assange, an advisory board member at Wikileaks, told IDG. But there's an added advantage for Wikileaks itself. The fact is that without news coverage a leaked document is rather useless and of no real value to anyone. So, after the documents are uploaded to the site and Wikileaks can confirm their authenticity, the journalist or rights group for which they were initially intended will receive the data exclusively for a set period giving them enough time to write the article about it. Wikileaks believes this approach will allow documents that would otherwise get little notice gain the notoriety they deserve.
"It's counterintuitive," Assange said. "You'd think the bigger and more important the document is, the more likely it will be reported on but that's absolutely not true. It's about supply and demand. Zero supply equals high demand, it has value. As soon as we release the material, the supply goes to infinity, so the perceived value goes to zero."